Research Notes

Principal Matters

It's no surprise that the typical principal of an elementary or
middle school is still a 50-year-old white male. But a new survey,
conducted for the National Association of Elementary School Principals,
suggests that women are fast catching up to men in the job.

The study, the seventh in a series of surveys commissioned every 10
years by the Alexandria, Va., principals' group, was based on responses
from more than 1,300 principals nationwide. After declining for the two
previous decades, the percentage of female elementary and middle school
principals has doubled over the past decade, rising from 20 percent in
1988 to 40 percent in 1998, the results showed.

The survey also suggests that principals are busier than ever, putting
in about 54 hours of work a week.

Nearly three-fourths of the principals also said that within the
past three years they had received more authority to make decisions at
the school--a reflection of the nationwide trend toward site-based
management.

Yet at the same time, the survey shows, a growing percentage of
principals feel their authority is not in balance with the degree to
which they are held accountable for their schools.

Researcher James Doud says principals may feel that way because
site-based-management teams involve parents and community members, as
well as principals, in their decisionmaking.

"On the one hand, principals are told, 'You have more authority,' "
he says. "On the other hand, you are told that you have to share that
authority with many people."

Copies of the report, "The K-8 Principal in 1998," are available to
nonmembers for $15.95 and to members for $12.95. Call or write NAESP
Educational Products, 1615 Duke St., Alexandria, VA 22314; (800)
38-NAESP.

Switching Schools

Changing schools even once between the 8th and 12th grades can
double a student's chances of failing to graduate on time.

That startling conclusion comes from a nationwide study published in
the November issue of the American Journal of Education.

As part of their study, Russell W. Rumberger and Katherine A. Larson
analyzed data on a nationwide sample of 12,000 students who were 8th
graders in 1988. The researchers, both from the University of
California, Santa Barbara, found that more than one-quarter of the
students they studied had changed schools between the 8th and 12th
grades.

Predictably, the students who moved from school to school were more
likely to be poor, urban, and members of minority groups than were
students with more stable school lives. In middle or junior high
school, the more mobile students also tended to be absent more often,
to have earned lower grades, and to have had more behavior
problems.

But even when researchers controlled for those and other kinds of
background characteristics, they found that changing schools still
significantly reduced a student's chances of finishing high school.

"There's a certain amount of risk involved in switching programs,"
says Mr. Rumberger, a professor of education at UC-Santa Barbara. "If
the programs don't match up well, students could lose credits."

The problem, Mr. Rumberger says, is not beyond educators' control,
however. His data show that students switch schools only 30 percent of
the time because their families have moved. He believes that transfers
made for other reasons--perhaps because of discipline
problems--distance students from school.

"We think there are implications both for parents and kids being
better informed and for schools and districts being held accountable
for how much movement they have in and out of their schools," he
adds.

Thinking Spatially

The ability to visualize a project in several dimensions and to
understand mechanics is important for engineers, physical scientists,
architects, and artists.

But, unlike gifted mathematics students, students who are spatially
talented often become classic underachievers in school, a report in the
fall issue of the American Educational Research Journal
says.

Three researchers from the University of Illinois at
Urbana-Champaign sifted through survey data on a national sample of
1,600 gifted high school seniors. Roughly half the students had scored
in the top 1 percent of their gender on a test of mathematical skills,
and the rest had similarly high spatial-skills scores.

Other test scores showed that all the students were capable of
succeeding in school. But, for the spatially gifted students, academic
success turned out to be much harder to grasp.

Even though the students in the spatial group had higher grades than
the mathematically oriented students in vocational and business
courses, they did worse in science, English, history, social studies,
and foreign languages--all the courses required for college
admission.

Spatially gifted students also received less college guidance from
school counselors, were less motivated by their lessons, and aspired
to--and achieved--lower levels of academic and occupational success.
Only 8 percent of the boys in the spatially oriented group, for
example, went on to earn doctoral degrees, compared with 36 percent of
the mathematically talented boys.

The study's Achilles' heel: The data date back to 1960. Still, the
researchers say, their findings may well apply to schools today.

In the 1990s, as in the 1960s, college-admissions tests focus
narrowly on gauging verbal and mathematical aptitudes. The researchers
believe that emphasis influences high school educators to do the
same.

Students with spatial talents "certainly appear to be discouraged or
not encouraged to go on, and that's a waste of their abilities and
talents," says Carol L. Gohm, a postdoctoral research associate at the
University of Illinois. Her co-authors on the report are Lloyd G.
Humphreys, a professor emeritus in psychology at the university, and
Grace Yao, who is now an assistant professor of psychology at National
Taiwan University.

Losing Sleep

Teenagers' sleep routines may depress both their grades and their
moods, two researchers say, following up earlier studies on
adolescents' sleep patterns.

The new study, which appeared in September in the journal Child
Development, was conducted by Amy R. Wolfson, an assistant
professor at the College of the Holy Cross in Worcester, Mass., and
Brown University sleep researcher Mary A. Carskadon. Previous studies
by Ms. Carskadon, Ms. Wolfson, and others have shown that adolescents
get less sleep than they need. The loss stems from their bodies'
changing sleep rhythms and high school starting times that are too
early. ("Too Little, Too Late,"
Oct. 11, 1995.)

In the new study, however, the researchers sought to better
understand how lack of sleep affects teenagers' lives. They asked 3,000
teenagers from six public schools in Rhode Island to report on their
sleep habits for two weeks. They found that:

Students who earned mostly C's, D's, and F's in school got, on
average, 25 minutes less of sleep each night than A and B students
did.

Teenagers who stayed up much later on weekends than they normally
did during the week also tended to get lower grades than peers whose
bedtimes were more consistent.

Students who were getting inadequate sleep were more sleepy,
moody, and prone to have behavior problems than were students who got
adequate sleep.

From ages 13 to 19, the total hours of sleep students got each
week night decreased by an average of 38 minutes.

Students in the study got an average of seven hours and 20
minutes of sleep each night--nearly two hours less than their bodies
needed.

"Undoubtedly," the authors write, "adolescents require more than
seven hours and 20 minutes of sleep to cope optimally with academic
demands, social pressures, driving, and job responsibilities." One
possible remedy for the problem, Ms. Wolfson added in an interview, may
be for schools to take a hard look at their starting times and course
schedules.

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